LONDON Irish remain second-bottom of the Premiership table after a disappointing performance away at Sale on Friday night.

The game was played in difficult conditions but it was Sale who coped better and they took the lead when Tom Brady beat James O’Connor to Danny Cipriani’s cross-field kick.

Cipriani extended the lead by kicking the conversion and the hosts went further ahead before the break, Dave Seymour forcing his way over the line after Sale managed to wheel around a driving maul.

The Sale fly-half missed that conversion, making the score 12-0 at half-time, but the lead moved on to 15 points shortly after the break, when Cipriani dissected the posts with a penalty.

Irish suffered a further setback as they lost Chris Hala-ufia to the sin-bin for a tip-tackle and while Ian Humphreys kicked a penalty to get them on the scoreboard, it was a disappointing evening for the visitors.

London Irish director of rugby, Brian Smith, said: “Sale played the conditions fairly well, so fair play to Sale, but there was a crazy bounce on a cross-field kick for their first try and seven points is always going to be a lot on a night like this.

I was a little disappointed that we had 10 scrum penalties go against us. The scrums were going backwards but there was binding on the arms.”

The Exiles are back in action next Sunday, when they host fellow strugglers Gloucester at the Madejski Stadium (kick-off 2pm).